Furuya Metal announced that it will invest in enhancing the ruthenium (Ru) refining capability of its Tsuchiura Plant, located at Sawabe in Tsuchiura City, Ibaraki.

Ruthenium_crystals

Furuya Metal’s Tsuchiura Plant has refining and recovery lines for high-purity ruthenium targets (thin film materials), catalysts, and other products, and is able to carry out high-purity refining within short time frames.

This capability-enhancement investment is in response to the growing demand, both within Japan as well as overseas, for high-purity ruthenium targets used in hard disks. The scale of the investment is 1.6 billion yen, with the first phase of 600 million yen planned to be invested by the end of December 2018.

Through the first phase of investment, the refining and recovery capability for ruthenium will be increased by approximately one ton monthly, from the current 2.4 tons monthly to 3.5 tons monthly. This increases the annual capability by 12 tons.

Furthermore, the remaining one billion yen will be invested by December 2019 during the second phase of the investment. The plan is to put in place a system to handle the growing demand for targets as well as chemical products such as catalysts.

Through the second phase of investment, ruthenium refining and recovery capability will be further increased, bringing it up to five tons per month. This will bring refining and recovery capability to approximately 60 tons each year, which is almost double the current capability.

Overview of Tsuchiura Plant

– Location: Tsuchiura Plant (located at Sawabe in Tsuchiura City, Ibaraki), Furuya Metal Co., Ltd.

– Floor area: Approximately 6,400 m2

– Business scope: Refining and recovery of ruthenium and iridium

Source: Company Press Release